Wednesday, June 20, 2007

ermaplus, a New York-based provider of anti-aging skin care solutions, has turned its attentions to anti-aging treatments for hair care with the launch of a new scalp conditioner, Keracyte.

The product is derived from the company's patented active ingredient Elastatropin, which forms a key ingredient in its anti-wrinkle treatment DermaLastyl.

It says that Keracyte has been formulated to stimulate hair follicles to make existing hair shafts thicker, stronger and longer, giving an impression of more luxurious and youthful looking hair.

However, the product also contains a catalytic anti-oxidant, Prolisel, which the company says protectects against the damaging effects of UV light and dihydrotestosterone (DHT).

DHT is thought to be 30 times more potent than testosterone and is responsible for many cases of male pattern baldness, whereas UV light has been attributed with speeding up the aging and thinning process in hair follicles.

"We believe that healthy skin is the key to healthy hair growth. It is widely known that hereditary hair loss occurs when DHT and UV light damage cells in scalp follicles," said Dr. Burt Ensley, PhD, CEO of Dermaplus.

Dr. Ensley went on to describe how the follicles get progressively smaller, shortening the hair growth cycle and eventually resulting in thinner and shorter follicles, and ultimately no hair growth.

"We know that human hair follicles are little factories associated with and responsible for production of proteins such as elastin and keratin," he continued. "Not only is tropoelastin produced by the cells in the hair follicles but the follicles themselves appear to depend on it."

The company says that to combat the age-related thinning and balding process in hair follicles, it has turned to the same process it uses ints DermaLastyl anti-wrinkle treatment.

This is because testing carried out by the company showed that the hair follicle growth responds and is encouraged by both elastatropin and prolisel.

Other ingredients included in the formulation include matrixyl 3000, argireline, hyaluronic acid, provitamin B, germaben and ProliSel

Dr. Ensley also says that some of the individuals using the treatment have reported that it has led to natural hair color being restored.

Increasingly hair care providers are turning their attentions to products that claim to have restorative properties, as the big race for increasingly effective anti-aging treatments spills into the hair care segment.

Perhaps the most high profile example of this has been the recent global launch from Unilever with a new line of Dove hair care products targeting mature women and their specific hair care requirements. by:www.cosmeticsdesign.com